I do find that slugs love peanut butter over all things
Yes, that sounds quite likely. I have some 'peanut butter made for birds' that I have found awkward to use for the birds, so you have given me an idea: I will try it in the woodland area where I see the slugs and snails.
I have to confess that one year I seemed to find snails in my back garden, everywhere all the time, and I collected them in a ventilated kitchen caddy with leaves in the bottom, and took them to my ...wait for it....front garden...
...I then put weekly vegetable trimmings out for them under a hedge in my front garden so that they would not feel too deprived. Luckily, a few years before, I had applied a dot of nail polish on their shells, (also after seeing the BBC programme 'The British Garden: Life and Death on your Lawn' (2017).
I have found that they stayed in the front garden and then gradually disappeared. ( I regularly found empty snail shells in the following years).
Luckily, I used a different shade of nail polish each year, so could tell from which year I had first identified each snail. I found they lived for at least 4 years.
Life got busier and by 2020 I no longer bothered applying the nail polish, but I am thinking of giving it another go, after reading your thread and research, @fire!
I have wondered about the theory that molluscs attack weaker plants and I have considered that they may well be able to sense when a plant is closer to the 'decaying' stage and then make a beeline for such a plant. I try to water plants in the morning rather than evening too - because the soil will have longer to dry out before night fall.
I don't mind too much if the molluscs stay in the bottom half of the garden in the 'woodland' but I move them every evening in the height of summer, if I find them amongst herbaceous plants by the house, and put them into a semi open compost pile in the shade near the back wall. I find slugs 'stay in their lane' more than the snails, unless I am kidding myself!
Sorry to witness the demise of the forum. 😥😥😥😡😡😡I am Spartacus
a few years before, I had applied a dot of nail polish on their shells, (also after seeing the BBC programme 'The British Garden: Life and Death on your Lawn' (2017). I have found that they stayed in the front garden and then gradually disappeared. ( I regularly found empty snail shells in the following years). Luckily, I used a different shade of nail polish each year, so could tell from which year I had first identified each snail. I found they lived for at least 4 years.
That's so cool that you did that! I am now determined to give it a go. I wonder if mini radio trackers could be applied to slugs. No doubt someone has done it somewhere.
😁 no doubt they have! Re the snails, it really was very satisfying just to have a rough idea of whether I had seen a snail before, it was quite amusing really. You must give it a go. I am thinking if I start painting them this autumn, I will try to log the info and report back here. 😄
Sorry to witness the demise of the forum. 😥😥😥😡😡😡I am Spartacus
This is one of the few occasions , I can see the appeal of nail polish 🤣🐌
If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.”—Marcus Tullius Cicero East facing, top of a hill clay-loam, cultivated for centuries (7 years by me). Birmingham
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sure
Yes, that sounds quite likely. I have some 'peanut butter made for birds' that I have found awkward to use for the birds, so you have given me an idea: I will try it in the woodland area where I see the slugs and snails.
I have to confess that one year I seemed to find snails in my back garden, everywhere all the time, and I collected them in a ventilated kitchen caddy with leaves in the bottom, and took them to my ...wait for it....front garden...
...I then put weekly vegetable trimmings out for them under a hedge in my front garden so that they would not feel too deprived. Luckily, a few years before, I had applied a dot of nail polish on their shells, (also after seeing the BBC programme 'The British Garden: Life and Death on your Lawn' (2017).
I have found that they stayed in the front garden and then gradually disappeared. ( I regularly found empty snail shells in the following years).
Luckily, I used a different shade of nail polish each year, so could tell from which year I had first identified each snail. I found they lived for at least 4 years.
Life got busier and by 2020 I no longer bothered applying the nail polish, but I am thinking of giving it another go, after reading your thread and research, @fire!
I have wondered about the theory that molluscs attack weaker plants and I have considered that they may well be able to sense when a plant is closer to the 'decaying' stage and then make a beeline for such a plant. I try to water plants in the morning rather than evening too - because the soil will have longer to dry out before night fall.
I don't mind too much if the molluscs stay in the bottom half of the garden in the 'woodland' but I move them every evening in the height of summer, if I find them amongst herbaceous plants by the house, and put them into a semi open compost pile in the shade near the back wall. I find slugs 'stay in their lane' more than the snails, unless I am kidding myself!
Re the snails, it really was very satisfying just to have a rough idea of whether I had seen a snail before, it was quite amusing really. You must give it a go. I am thinking if I start painting them this autumn, I will try to log the info and report back here. 😄
East facing, top of a hill clay-loam, cultivated for centuries (7 years by me). Birmingham